Lijun Song is an Associate Professor of Sociology, MHS (Medicine, Health, and Society), and Asian Studies, and directs the SNAIL (Social Networks and Inequalities Lab). Her research investigates how societies produce and reproduce inequalities. Her core research interests encompass social networks, health, singlehood, social stratification (gender/sexuality, race/ethnicity, and class), and aging and the life course. Currently, she is developing social cost theory to understand the detrimental consequences of social networks, and leading an NIH R56 (high priority, short-term) project on social networks and health among older never-married adults.
Her scholarship has appeared in such journals as the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Social Forces, Social Networks, Social Psychology Quarterly, Social Science and Medicine, Society and Mental Health, Sociological Perspectives, and Work and Occupations. Her work has garnered support from institutions such as the National Institutes of Health, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange. Furthermore, she has been honored with two publication awards from the American Sociological Association (ASA): one from the Section on Asia/Asian America and another from the Section on Sociology of Mental Health. She has been elected as the Chair-Elect of two ASA Sections: Medical Sociology, and Sociology of Mental Health. For more information, please refer to her CV, Google Scholar page, and ResearchGate page.